son proceeds to say, "that if a comparison was to be drawn between the above expense and that of planting groups of plants from the nursery, keeping enclosures up for twenty years, and losing the rent on the ground occupied, the Allanton system is much preferable on the point of economy."

The evidence of various gentlemen who have already adopted Sir Henry Steuart's system on their own estates, is given at length in the book before us:-Mr Smith, of Jordanhill, in Lanarkshire, appears to have made the largest experiments next to the inventor himself; and he states the results as uniformly successful. Before his workmen attained proficiency in the art, the individual trees cost from fifteen to eighteen shillings each, when transported about a mile; but in his later operations the charge was reduced to eight shillings for very handsome subjects, and six shillings for those of an inferior description.

Mr Mac Call, of Ibroxhill, another gentleman in the same neighbourhood, estimates the cost of his operations on trees, from eighteen to twenty-eight feet high, at eight shillings and tenpence per tree. Mr Watson of Linthouse, in Renfrewshire, reckons that his trees, being on an average thirty feet high, cost him fourteen shillings the tree. Sir Charles Macdonald Lockhart, of Lee, and Sir Walter Scott, of Abbotsford, mention their expenses as trifling; and Mr Elliot Lockhart (M. P. for Selkirkshire), states ten shillings as the average cost of transplanting trees from twenty-four to thirty-five feet in height. All these gentlemen attest the success of their operations, and their thorough belief in the soundness of their ingenious master's doctrine.

It ought to be observed, that no special account seems, in any of these cases, to have been kept of the after treatment of the transplanted tree, by watering and manuring, which must differ very much, according to circumstances. Something, however, must be added on this account to almost all the prices quoted by the experimentalists above mentioned.

We now come to Sir Henry's account of his own expenses, which, with the laudable and honourable desire to be as communicative and candid as possible, he has presented under various forms. The largest trees which Sir Henry Steuart himself has been in the habit of removing

"being from twenty-five to thirty-five feet high, may be managed," he informs us, "by expert and experienced workmen, for from 10s. to 13s. each. at half a mile's distance: and the smallest, being from eighteen to five-and-twenty feet, for from 63 to 83. With workmen awkward or inexperienced, it will not seem surprising, that it should require a third part, or even a half more fully to follow out the practice which has been recommended. As to wood for close plantations, or for bush-planting in the park, the trees may be transferred for about 3s. 6d., and the stools of underwood for from 1s. to 2s. per stool.”—P. 341.

In another view of his expenditure, Sir Henry Steuart fixes on a very considerable space of ground, which he had fully occupied with

wood during a period of eight years, and shows data for rating his annual expenditure at fifty-eight pounds ten shillings yearly ;—a sum certainly not too extravagant tobe bestowed on any favourite object of pursuit, and far inferior in amount to that which is, in most instances, thrown away on a pet-farm. We have dwelt thus long on the subject of expense, because it forms the most formidable objection to every new system, is most generally adopted, and most completely startling to the student. But where so many persons, acting with the very purpose of experiment, after allowance has been made for difference of circumstances, are found to come so near each other in their estimates, and that twelve shillings for the expense of transplanting a tree of thirty feet high forms the average of the calculation, it will not surely be deemed an extraordinary tax on so important an operation.

But, although we have found the system to be at once original, effectual, and attended with moderate expense, we are not sanguine enough to hope that it will at once find general introduction. The application of steam and of gas to the important functions which they at present perform, was slowly and reluctantly adopted, after they had been opposed for many years by the prejudices of the public. Yet these were supported by such effective arguments ad crumenam, as might, one would have thought, have ensured their advocates a favourable hearing. The present discoverer is a gentleman of liberal fortune, who, after having ornamented his own domain, has little interest whether his neighbours imitate his example or no. The system, too, must be subjected to the usual style of sneering misrepresentation which is applied to all innovators, until they gain the public to their side, and rise above the reach of detraction. We have also to anticipate the indifference of country-gentlemen, too indolent to conquer the difficulty of getting the fitting and indispensable machinery, or to procure the assistance of experienced workEven in the cases in which the new system may be brought to a trial, it may fall under discredit from the haste of the proprietor, or the no less formidable conceit and prejudices of the workman. The one may be disposed to leave out or hurry over some of the details, which are peculiarly slow and gradual, though producing such an immediate effect when completed; the other, unless closely watched, will assuredly revert to his own ancient practice, in despite of every charge to the contrary. In either case, the failure which may ensue will be imputed to the Allanton system, though it should be rather attributed to departure from its rules.

men.

Notwithstanding all these obstacles, the principle is so good, and the application so successful, that we shall be much surprised if, erelong, some professional person does not make himself master of

not fail to achieve when it is found he possesses the art of changing the face of nature, like the scenes in a theatre, and can convert, almost instantly, a desert to an Eden. Nurserymen and designers will then find it for their interest to have the necessary machinery, and gangs of experienced workmen, to enable them to contract for raising, transferring, and upholding any particular number of trees,' which a country-gentleman of moderate fortune may desire to place in groups, or singly, in his park. The alteration will be thus effected without the proprietor, who wishes but to transplant some score or two of trees, being obliged to incur the full expenses of providing and instructing superintendents, as if he meant to countermarch the whole advance of Birnam wood to Dunsinane. Earlier or later, this beautiful and rational system will be brought into general action, when it will do more to advance the picturesque beauty of the country in five years than the slow methods hitherto adopted can attain in fifty.

Our readers are now enabled to answer with confidence the question of Macbeth :

"Who can impress the forest? Bid the tree

Unfix his earth-bound root?"

But the subject, though to ourselves of special interest, has already, perhaps, detained some readers too long, Non omnes arbusta juvant.

(This Article, headed, "History of Scotland. By PATRICK FRASER TYTLER, Esq, F.R.S.E. and F.A.S. Volumes 1 and 2. 8vo. Edinburgh, 1829," appeared in the Quarterly Review for November, 1829.]

In our last Number, we made some remarks on the history of the northern part of this island during those ages in which the light dawns slowly as the sunrise on a morning of mist. The present author has adopted for the subject of his work a period somewhat later than that at which we left off, and thus escapes the dim and doubtful discussion over which our heads have ached, and our readers' eyes have perhaps slumbered. Feeling our own optics a little too much dazzled by passing at once from the darkness of Kenneth MacAlpine's period into the comparative full light of Alexander the

latter era; nor can we do so without expressing our hope that Mr Tytler may find time, before completing his projected labours, to furnish us with some preliminary matter in the shape of introduction, or otherwise, so as to inform his readers of what royal race Alexander sprung, and over what people he reigned.

On this point it is singular to discover that the Scots, whose fabulous history represented them, down to the end of the eighteenth century, as a nation of the purest blood and most ancient descent in Europe, can, notwithstanding that vaunt, be easily traced as a mixed race, formed out of the collision and subsequent union of several different populations, which remained slightly connected or occasionally dissevered, till the difference in their manners was worn away by time, and they coalesced at length into one people and kingdom.

We have formerly shown that, in the year 496, a body of Irish, then called Scots, had colonized Argyllshire, and made fierce wars on the decaying province of Rome, by the assistance, doubtless, of those called Meatæ, or Middle Britons, who, subjected by the Romans during their power, rose against them when it began to decline. These Scots, moreover, made war upon the Caledonians, more latterly called Northern Picts or Deucaledonians, who had for ages been in possession of the greater part of Angusshire, Perthshire, Fife, and the north-east of Scotland up to the Moray firth. Beyond that estuary it would appear the Scandinavians had colonies upon the fertile shores of Moray, and among the mountains of Sutherland, of which the name speaks for itself that it was given by the Norwegians; and probably they had also settlements in Caithness and the Orcades. When, therefore, Kenneth finally defeated, dispersed, and destroyed the Picts, he obtained possession of the middle provinces of Scotland from sea to sea, having joined his original dominions on St George's Channel to the eastern shores washed by the German Ocean. Behind him, to the north-east, lay the warlike and poor Scandinavians; but in front of his kingdom, and between that and the present English frontier, lay three states, enjoying a boisterous and unsettled independence, and each peopled by a mixed race.

The first of these was Galloway, then extended considerably beyond the limits of the shires of Wigton and Kirkcudbright, to which the name is now limited. This remote and desolate region erelong acknowledged a vassalage to the crown; but being inhabited by a very brave and barbarous people, continued, substantially, a separate state till about 1234. Secondly, bounded on the east, and partly on the north, by Galloway, lay Strathclwyd, inhabited by British tribes, of the nation generally called Meatæ. These also were compelled to acknowledge the superiority of the throne. They may be generally described as occupying the territory from the castle of Dunbarton to

nations, were variable and uncertain, as they failed or succeeded in wars with their neighbours. The last mention of the inhabitants of Strathclwyd, as a people having a separate kinglet or prince, occurs in 1018. Thirdly, still to the eastward of the Strathclwyd Britons lay the provinces now called Berwickshire and the three Lothians. This fertile country was the object of cupidity, in a much greater degree, than the barren mountains of the more western frontier; and, after the decay of the Roman power, it lay peculiarly exposed to the inroads of the Picts, who appear to have settled there a large division of their nation, called Vecturiones, who mingled, doubtless, among such remains of Britons as might still dwell to the south of the Firth of Forth. But when the sword of the Saxons drove back the Pictish incursions, the victors appear to have won from the Picts all the flat country comprehending Berwickshire and East Lothian, and the greater part of West Lothian, which they joined to the Saxon kingdom of Deiria, or Northumberland. The Northumbrian Saxons being in their turn hard pressed by the Danes, their kingdom was so much weakened, that the Scots were tempted to cross the frith of Forth, then called the Scottish Sea, for the purpose of occupying Lothian ; and about 830 they made themselves masters of the keys of that province, Dunbar and Edwinsbury (Edinburgh). At a later period (961), Edgar, King of England, in a council held at York, divided the territory hitherto designated as Northumberland, into two parts. The more southern half corresponds with the modern county of Northumberland, the northern moiety comprehended Lothian and the district now called Berwickshire. Finding this latter division of the country so obnoxious to the attacks of the Scots, Edgar made an agreement with Kenneth the Second, and conferred upon him that portion, to be held of the English crown. Thus came Lothian to the government of the Northern Princes, but by grant from the King of England, and therefore under condition of paying homage-a circumstance which has thrown additional confusion into a confused part of British history. Finally, upon like terms, a considerable part of Westmoreland and Cumberland was sometime after conceded to the Scot.

From the time of Kenneth MacAlpine to that of Macbeth-that is, from 841 to 1040, a space of about two centuries, we have a line of fifteen kings of Scots, of whom it is easy to perceive that, in spite of the absurd prejudices concerning the inferiority of the Gaelic race, they sustained successfully the sceptre of Kenneth, and, by repeated battles both with the English and the Danes, not only repelled the attacks of their neighbours, but consolidated the strength of their kingdom, gradually modelling an association of barbarous and in part wandering tribes into the consistence of a regular state.